2000” may be considerably less likely than the “Blade Runner” scenario. While Starr’s intent is to inspire the “dominant Establishment” of the present by focusing on the “courage and zest” of its predecessors, Davis’ approach ultimately proves more satisfying, for it forthrightly examines what increasing numbers of us secretly fear: the possibility that the bright future outlined by Starr and the Bradley Administration in the report “L.A. L.A.-bashing was a thriving industry, of course, long before Fred Allen dubbed this town “a nice place to live if you’re an orange.” But Mike Davis’ “City of Quartz” is the first major study to examine a broad range of “daytime” problems with consistent acuity.Īn urban-history instructor at CalArts, Davis focuses on those less flattering realities that Starr passed over in pursuit of the dream: Where Starr hails the “Bismarckian municipal will” that created the mammoth Red Car transit system and San Pedro port virtually overnight, Davis reminds us that the same will also smashed L.A.’s labor movement where Starr celebrates black leaders like Ralph Bunche, who saluted the “indomitable will and boundless optimism” of young African Americans, Davis reminds us that many more sympathized with Langston Hughes, who despaired that “so far as Negroes are concerned, Hollywood might just as well be controlled by Hitler.”
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